And I need to consider if I can be okay with them.
“I’m so sorry, Pres.” He turns to me, his dark eyes begging for me to understand.
Swallowing my concerns, I step into him and pull him against me for a minute.
“I am, too. But we can take our burgers to go.”
Keaton stills. “You want to come with me?”
I nod. “If you’ll let me. I want to see what you do. And I’m here to spend the night with you, no matter where that takes us.”
Awe, and a bit of storminess, shine down on me as he pins with me his gaze. “This could get ugly. We could lose the babies, or the ewe herself.”
The thought sends an arrow of sadness straight through my heart. “I’m a big girl. Let me come to work with you. Seeing your passion, it will help me understand you better. And I want to understand everything about you.”
Keaton looks like I just told him the secret to life. “All right. But when we get there, you stand back. Only move if I ask you to. Got it?”
I crack a small smile. “Yes, sir.” He frowns, and I roll my eyes. “Of course. I’ll keep out of the way unless you need me to hold a leg.”
We’re there in twenty minutes flat, thanks to Keaton’s speeding. We munch on burgers on the way, eating them one-handed as he details what a twin animal birth can be like. How many he’s seen, what he might need to do for this lamb after looking at the pictures the farm staff sent. Listening to him talk is addicting; even if I know nothing about veterinary medicine, the way Keaton talks about his craft is admirable.
Once we arrive, darkness swamping the fields and barns of this small dairy farm, Keaton goes straight for his trunk.
“Here.” He hands me a rubbery looking suit that I realize after a few seconds are goulashes. “They are probably going to be big on you, but if you want to be in the pen, you’re going to want those on.”
I don’t talk, trying to digest everything that’s about to happen. I don’t mind a little blood and guts, but I’ve never witnessed a human birth, let alone a large animal. Part of me was downright scared, and the other was tingling with excitement.
Keaton pulls out a large case, almost like a toolbox, and then shuts the trunk, walking toward the only dwelling with lights on.
“Remember what I said.” He looks down at me with softness.
I nod and then see his face change. This is the doctor in him, the man who needs to put emotions aside to save the animal in need. He can’t hold my hand right now, and this is his way of telling me that if I can’t handle this, I have to take care of myself.
The dwelling with light is really just a small barn, gated off by large pens where I assume animals are kept. Right now, though, there is only one animal in here, and she’s crying out as if someone was stabbing her. The guttural, anguished sounds of the sheep penetrate my heart and make me suck in a lungful of breath. Anyone can hear and see how much agony she’s in … and I just want it to stop for her sake.
Keaton makes quick work of getting brought up to speed by the farm owners and then jumps right in. He examines the sheep, getting down next to her. From my vantage point, I can see something sticking out of her vaginal opening, and it looks …
Well, I’m no medical professional but it doesn’t look good.
“I’m going to have to get in there and pull the lamb out myself. It’s going to hurt her, you’ll need to hold her.” Keaton’s voice is the epitome of calm.
Two of the men move toward the animal while Keaton pulls out a few tools and a needle full of something that he injects her with. I hope to God it’s the best epidural a sheep can get.
Something in me moves without a thought passing through my head as if my limbs are on autopilot. I go to her, this wounded female animal, and take a hold of her chin, directing her eyes up and into mine.
“Shh, baby. It’s going to be okay.” I stroke her fur rhythmically.
“All right, hold her steady.” Keaton’s fierce eyes flash to me.
We all hunker down, and I try to keep my focus on her pained eyes. The minute Keaton begins to deliver the baby, I feel it radiate throughout her body. Her limbs go stiff and start to shake, and the sounds coming out of her throat are a hundred times worse than anything I’ve ever heard.
“Hold her!” Keaton snaps, and while I can’t see what he’s doing from my vantage point, the frustration on his brow is making me nervous.
What feels like a lifetime, but is probably only another minute, later, I hear the sigh from the mama sheep and a mewling cry from what must be the baby Keaton helped her deliver.
“All right, mama, one more.” Keaton strokes her belly.
There is a lapse between the babies, and I feel the animal breathe some relief. She’s gathering strength, regaining some of her wits now that the pain of the botched delivery is subsiding.
“She’s contracting. Here we go!”
The compassionate, thorough vet, the one I met all those months ago, is deep in the middle of doing what he does best. To watch him in the environment he excels the most in … it’s an honor. Watching Keaton work is an art form.
With one last push, grunts emitting from her throat, the second lamb slides out.
“Good job,” I whisper in her ear, a tear of joy sliding down my cheek.
Being in that moment, with this animal and with the man who helped her through it … it was breathtaking. There is a buzz in the air that pierces straight through my body. It’s life itself, creating sparks of electricity all around us. I’ve never felt more invincible, or more human. The juxtaposition is so intense that I might start to weep.
I stand, moving to the side of the pen as the farm owners and hands tend to the mother and babies.
“That was incredible.” I breathe, clutching my chest to make sure my heart is still beating.
He comes toward me, pinning my back to the wooden wall of the stall. His lips cover mine, his gloved hands staying at his sides. I’m not even worried about the slime and blood getting on me, which is odd, but …
I can only focus on the single point of contact. His mouth on mine. Possessing it so wildly that I might pass out from the assault.
The kiss is brutal and passionate, a lifeline connecting the two of us. Keaton stokes my body like it’s a flame and he’s an arsonist, just from the skilled use of his tongue and teeth.
We just watched life being born, a soul come into the world. It was beautiful and painful, all of the emotions mixing into one.
Only when one of the newborn lambs whimpers does he pull away, his forehead pressing into mine.
“You just keep surprising me.” The words are whispered reverence.
My eyes stay glued to his, words failing me.
Keaton swivels his head around to check on the baby lambs. “Let me tend to them. Go wash up and I’ll meet you back at the truck in ten.”
I take the opportunity to go wash up, because as much as that was incredible, no one likes the stench of blood and afterbirth on them. I hose down, even spraying some of my hair because the night is hot and humid, and my blood feels like lava. Something about watching a life come into this world has my adrenaline jacked to eleven.
Ten minutes later, Keaton joins me where I sit on the hood of his truck.
“Thanks for coming out here.” We aren’t touching, and both of our gazes look off into the dark fields beyond.
“That was truly amazing, Keaton. How do … how are you so sure of yourself?”
I think that’s the thing I both envy and love about him. He always seems so confident in what he’s doing. I can’t even pick out tea without changing my mind six times, and yet he could be thrown into a burning building and get everyone out alive without questioning one move.
A small laugh emits roughly from his throat. “Isn’t that the show I put on? Truthfully, I’m better at acting confident than actually being it. If you fool yourself long enough into thinking you know exactly what you’re doing … at some point, those around you start believin
g it. Even if you know, deep down it’s a lie. That’s my dirty little secret if you want to know the honest truth of it. I pretend to be the strong leader, my actions show a level-headed, responsible man who knows the correct path. But inside, I’m just as goddamn scared as everybody else. I lie awake at night wondering if my life means anything; if I’ve made the right choices. I’m not sure of myself, Presley. It’s a house of cards. One stiff breeze and I come crumbling down.”
His confession shakes me to the core, and I feel the raw honesty ripple through my gut all the way out to my fingertips. They tingle as I try to wrap my mind around something. Because Keaton admitting that he’s just as scared as everyone else, that his confidence is a lie, doesn’t make me want to run from him.
That feeling I’m trying to grasp? It’s bottomless, hopeless love. The kind I have no shot at falling out of. This man, the one I originally thought couldn’t hold a candle to me or my fast lifestyle, has opened my eyes to a world of feelings I’d had no idea existed within me.
But instead of confessing that, I decide to give him just a small piece of me back.
“Sometimes I wish I could go back and tell my seventeen-year-old self that she was enough. That she is enough. I grew up thinking that everything I did and everything I was just never measured up. I wish I could tell her that things get so much better. That she should laugh more and stop worrying so much about what other people think. I wish I could tell her that she doesn’t have to have a conventional dream or even a conventional life. She doesn’t need to move to a city and get a high-paying job. Most of all, I wish I could tell her that the strength she needs is already inside her if she would just open her eyes and look.”
He doesn’t speak, and our mutual confessions hang in the air.
At the exact same moment, we reach across the hood, our fingers lacing, the crackle of electricity between our hands the only response we both need.
26
Keaton
I hadn’t felt like getting out of bed this morning … so I hadn’t.
Presley had felt too good, and I was getting used to waking up to her in my house. The past two weeks, since the night a sheep’s labor interrupted our backyard dinner, we’d been inseparable. Aside from work, and the occasional family or animal emergency, I was with her.
The redheaded temptress who made me laugh just as much as she drove me absolutely crazy with lust. In almost three short months, Presley had completely taken over my life, inserting herself in all of my thoughts and every decision I made.
Last week, I’d told two after-hours calls to wait until my office was open in the morning. I ignored a request from Mom to come over and cut the lawn, instead passing the task off to Forrest. Who, by the way, was still texting me bitching about it a week later.
And Fletcher …
While worry still needled my brain every five minutes I thought about my little brother, my heart tugged me in the direction of the kind, spontaneous woman who kept surprising me around every corner. I hadn’t heard from him in a week, and I was trying to be okay with that. I was his brother, not his father.
Like Presley had said … I didn’t have to be everyone’s hero.
And now that I thought about and had spent the past two weeks living my life the exact way I wanted to—tangled up with the girl who didn’t know yet that I was in love with her—I saw just how much my strength and responsibility were taken advantage of.
I wasn’t just a helping hand or the stoic leader … I was their errand boy. The fact that Forrest was complaining about mowing his mother’s lawn for the first time in five years that I hadn’t felt like doing it? It was pathetic. So was the fact that neither he nor Bowen had given me an update about Fletcher … which meant neither of them felt the duty to keep an eye out for him.
Same thing with my practice. Did Nelson really need to bring his cat in at one a.m. on a Thursday because she’d had a little spasm in her sleep and then went right back to snoozing? And couldn’t the wellness visit of a litter of puppies wait until Monday when I’d already gone to Gloria’s house on Saturday—a weekend day I might add—to check that they were all healthy and thriving?
I’d trapped myself in this role of servant instead of the one of volunteer. I’d offered to help so much that my friends and family just expected it of me now … they were abusing my kindness and caring.
And now that I had a woman in my life who was quickly becoming more than all of that … I didn’t want to get out of bed to serve the community who had been using me for a while now.
My hands slide down Presley’s naked ribcage, and she whimpers in delight as the silk of her skin caresses my fingertips.
“Your body … it was made for me to touch.” I breathe, bringing my lips to the curve of her breast.
“You are a total tease.” She chuckles on a moan.
My mouth hovers over her skin, never touching, but the hot air of my breath gets her worked up to the point that she’s arching up to follow my lips.
We’ve been in bed half the morning, what with both of us calling out of work. It was reckless and immature, but I’d never done it and Presley had been daring me to try it for weeks, so here we were.
I have to say, with my hard cock in my hand, poised between my girlfriend’s thighs, it was the best damn decision I’d ever made.
“What, no oral this morning?” Presley pants as I draw the head of my cock up and down her slit.
I press in, the tiniest fraction of an inch, making us both growl for more.
“You don’t need it, you’re already so wet for me,” I grit out, my teeth clamping together as pleasure shoots down my spine.
And without warning, I sheath myself fully into her heat. The move temporarily blinds me, my vision hot white, and when I’m finally able to regain composure, Presley has her tits in her hands, massaging her own nipples.
The sight almost makes me shoot my load right there.
“Fuck.” I pull out slightly and push right back in, the small movement sending dangerous vibrations to my balls.
“I love it when you curse. Something about that dirty word coming out of that good boy mouth …” Presley breaks off when I slam into her, her legs shaking as they tighten around my waist.
I drill her into the bed, my lips latching onto her neck, my intention to leave a mark. This woman of mine, she drives me to insanity. The springs of the mattress creak and her moans fill my ears, spurring me to move even faster.
“Get on your knees.”
I want her from behind so badly; I see red.
Presley rolls over like a cat in heat, a fox who’s being chased but wants to get caught. She positions herself for me, her red locks spilling over her back, and when those green eyes flash at me in challenge, I drive in to the hilt.
Holding her hips in my hands, I fuck her. There is no other word for what we’re doing. It’s hot, sweaty fucking in the middle of the day … and I’m so turned on by how not normal this is for my everyday life that every sense beside those connected to Presley is dulled.
Which is why I don’t hear it at first. Somewhere on the floor, probably under a pile of clothes, my phone starts buzzing. I ignore it as I’m … currently occupied.
“Do you … need to … get that?” Presley gasps, her fingers digging into the bedsheets.
I shake my head, using my teeth to scrape across her spine. She tenses up, letting out a sexy, guttural moan as my right hand reaches around to nudge her right leg out farther, spreading her wider for me.
“No,” I grunt, stroking harder now.
My hips roll every time I’m seated deep, right down to my balls.
Responsibility and worry try to claw their way to the forefront of my brain. Someone is calling me, and my phone won’t stop ringing. My family, Deirdre, a patient … someone is probably in need. But right now … I don’t care.
I’m in bed with a woman who has changed my whole life perspective, and I wouldn’t pick up that phone even if there was a gun to my head. Th
at’s how much I’m willing to sacrifice to be with her.
“I’m going to come,” Presley moan-whispers, and it’s the sweetest sentence I’ve ever heard.
Not the sweetest sound, because that comes a moment later when she’s burying her face in the pillows.
“That’s it, baby, yeahhh …” I coax her, wanting to draw out her orgasm as long as possible.
And when I feel the last of it start to leave her, I let go, jutting up against her perky ass and feeling the come burst out of my tip as her cheeks slap back against my groin.
I lose my breath, flashes of pleasure rolling over me, drowning me. At some point, I collapse onto Presley, our slick bodies one on top of the other.
“So, you happy you cut class now?”
Her mocking voice is granted a rough laugh back.
“Playing hooky is starting to grow on me.” I roll off of her but take her hand and keep it in mine.
She plants a kiss on our joined hands. “I’ve created a monster.”
In more ways than she knows.
27
Presley
“Oh, fudge!”
Grandma’s words follow a crashing sound that comes from the supply room.
I rush around the counter and across the store, into the back.
“I’ll be right back!” I yell to the two customers checking out books in the fiction section.
When I get back there, a dozen boxes have spilled onto the floor and Grandma is kneeling among them.
“Oh my God, are you hurt?” Bending, I check to see if there is any blood or broken bones.
“I’m fine, I’m fine.” She swats me away. “Just the damn box that was stuck.”
Taking her elbow, I help her up and keep my hold on her just in case she’s shaky. “What were you trying to get?”
“The damn box of packing envelopes,” she replies crankily.
My heart stills. “Grandma, the packing envelopes are on the bottom shelf over there by the duct tape.”
She’s silent for a moment, and I know she either couldn’t read the boxes she’d just knocked down, or she’d forgotten that’s where we always kept those envelopes.
Fleeting (Nash Brothers Book 1) Page 12
